Aloha! Merry Christmas and Happiest New Year to you and your loved ones! Our 2009 has started quite merrily, it snowed a wee bit yesterday, Bodra has been in bed the past few days with a slight hacking cough, Lauren is in a similar place, but here I am happily typing away to the few people who may read this (Hi Mum, Hi Carolyn!!).
So since the last entry, not much has gone on. Our apartment has been graced with the presence of yet another dosser, Lauren Miller the zombie-slayer. She was once my neighbour back in Henderson Valley times. She’s pretty fantastic and has brought a few new flavours to our lifestyle. Being a non-carnivore, Lauren fits right in with our groove.
Dewi took us out to Bath to have a wander around the Christmas Markets there. Dewi drove us to the outskirts then we parked on the grounds of a horse track and caught a bus from there to the town centre- finally experiencing this Park & Ride phenomena! Pretty great given that we didn’t have to waste time trying to find a car park in town and were delivered the the main hub. I enjoyed some Vin Chaud there- I think I tried some with Cognac which was not to my liking. We were entertained by a unique Winter busking act- semi-naked men (in animal undies) doing hand stands with sparklers protruding from a rude place. Pics & vids.
Lauren joined our Christmas festivities which we shared with one of Bodra’s work associates, David Zilberberg, and his family, Olga and Noa. Bodra has been helping David out with moving into their new home, so we thought it would be fun to be part of their first Christmas in their new abode. I believe quite a relaxed and well-fed time was had by one and all. We brought our tasty vegetarian fare- beetroot salad, butterbean and onion soup, spicy peanut croquettes, leek & walnut stuffed onions, apple crumble and casatta. Yum!
Bodra, Kim, Ezra and I just returned from our trip to Snowdonia. We had an amazing time, really relaxing company and environment and perfect weather the entire week there. Nothing is better than sunshine, blue sky and wonderful friends!
Here is a link to our adventures there- Snowdonia Pics
& our Snowdonia videos…
Ez and Kim took us to a farm in Herefordshire, where we were all able to pat Owls and feed farm animals- a real treat, despite the freezing temperature we had to endure as we walked around the farm. We even saw the rare Red Squirrel. Then we went to an area called Llanrug in North Wales and stayed a week in a very sweet cottage. “Set in four acres of farmland, Tyddyn Ddeugoedd was the small cottage built for the Shepherd and the labourers who worked for the 17th century small holding known as Drws y Ddeugoed.” Being a stone cottage, it was pretty cold, but we had a fireplace which made all the difference. There’s something very soothing in feeding fresh logs into a fire and watching the heat and flames grow.
Bodra and I had our third year anniversary in the cottage- a lovely lazy day with a wander through one of the nearby towns & lunch at the Black Boy Inn. Kim and Ez made us dinner as well, so we were properly spoilt for our very special day! Bodra gifted me with a very exotic Swarovski Crystal Waterlily tea-light. I gave him a couple graphic novels. (Bodra wins the prize for best gift giving!)
We mostly spent the week playing games and watching movies (awesome ones like “Slumdog Millionaire”), but we did make the most of the beautiful weather with a walk up Mt Snowdon. It was quite a challenging climb to the top, some parts of the track require careful footwork as you cross over piles of rocks. We saw icicles around the creeks, and some areas were iced over. But no snow… Ezra and Kim made it all the more rewarding when they shared their pineapple lumbs and barbecue shapes at the top. Added to the goodies was a thermos of milo! The view from the top was rather outstanding. You definitely felt like you achieved something. Not surprisingly, I heard a few Southern Hemisphere accents at the peak.
We also made a stop on the way back home near Stockport, to visit Jo & Chris and their charming bubby Michael. Let’s just say it was very, very enjoyable holding their cuddly boy… very, very…. and hearing news about home from Jo & Chris made us feel that more proud to be NZer’s. Sweet!!
So, currently we are looking forward to our trip to Egypt- now in March hopefully. Hopefully we will see Cairo as well as doing the diving in Marsa Alam, but apparently it is quite difficult trying to see the sites we were hoping to get to- Petra and Abu Simbel- without spending a lot of time traveling by bus (not our favourite mode of travel by any stretch of the imagination). One of the tricky things is trying to achieve an actual relaxing holiday, rather than just spending the majority of your time in transition between tourist spots.
We are yet to plan all our travel arrangements, but we have finished doing all the pool sessions for our Open Water Recreational Diver licence & passed the theory test. I’m feeling a bit nervous about the timings we have chosen to dive in Marsa Alam, as the area is meant to be quite prevalent with stinging jellyfish. But I really want to see a Dugong!!!
Then in June we are hoping to get to Pennysylvania (is that how you spell it?) to visit Dan & Liz Kerr, then dash up to Canada for a couple weeks with Carolyn. Somehow we’ve got to fit in all the last bits of Europe (Switzerland? France? Greece?) too, as Bodra has made it his new years resolution to get back to NZ before the end of the year.
I hope all is fantastic in your worlds!!! Things are pretty fantastic here! 
:-) Oh yes, and I’ve been blonde for the past few months in case you didn’t notice… this will be changed shortly… perhaps!
Recent Comments